An F-16 fighter aircraft has a weapons rail at the end of each wing. The rail receives a missile, such as the AIM-9 (Sidewinder), an air-to-air missile.
Inside of the rail are electrical contacts used for firing the weapon. The electrical contacts are connected to a weapons firing circuit, operated from the cockpit of the aircraft.
Aircraft weapons systems are frequently tested in order to ensure reliability. The liability can literally be the difference between life and death, as a pilot engaged in air-to-air combat is disadvantaged by a missile that will not fire when commanded to do so.
The weapons circuit is tested, when the aircraft is on the ground, by locating a connector in the rail so as to make contact with the electrical contacts. The connector is part of a test set.
In the prior art, positioning the test set connector in the rail is time consuming and laborious. The connector is inserted into the end of the rail and then slid to where the contacts are. Unfortunately, the ends of the rail are not normally accessible and are covered by part of the wing, necessitating disassembly of the wing in order to access the end of the rail to allow insertion of the connector. This disassembly adds to the time and labor in testing the weapons circuit. In addition, aircraft maintenance practice prefers that onboard electrical circuits be tested with a minimum amount of disassembly of the aircraft.